Sri Aurobindo
Bande Mataram
Calcutta, June 27th, 1907
Part Four. Bande Mataram under the Editorship of
of Sri Aurobindo (28 May – 22 December 1907)
Khulna Oppressions
What is the reason of the extraordinary activity of Government oppression in the Khulna District.
At the present rate Khulna promises to be the Barisal of West Bengal.
A District Conference forbidden and held, a prosecution for sedition against a leading pleader and influential citizen of the chief town of the District, a prosecution of a local Nationalist paper, a summons to all the leading men of a Sub-divisional town to show cause why they should not be bound down because they intend to hold a Conference, this is no bad record in the course of a few weeks.
Of course the reason for this official jehad against Swadeshi in Khulna is precisely the same as the reason for the jehad in Barisal.
Barisal has been selected for the most wanton and disgraceful series of oppressions solely because it is the district in East Bengal which is best organized for the work of Swadeshi and self-help.
It is to break down the organization of Nationalism that the bureaucracy is now struggling with all the resources that a system of arbitrary, absolute, personal rule places at their disposal.
Khulna is the first district in West Bengal which has set itself heart and soul to the work of organizing Swadeshi and 
Swaraj and Khulna suffers accordingly.
This is the real reason of the attempts made by the Khulna officials to stop or punish the holding of Conferences.
These District and Sub-divisional Conferences are especially dreaded by the bureaucracy because they know them to be the first step towards organization.
We welcome the oppressions in Khulna because they mean the beginning of a true awakening in West Bengal.
After its splendidly successful Conference Jessore ought to organize itself as Khulna has been doing.
The Twenty-four Parganas and Midnapore will soon follow and as the organization spreads, the oppression will go with it and with the oppression will come the awakening.